


How Cam Found Out (And How He Didn't)

by Leyenn



Category: Stargate - All Series, Stargate SG-1
Genre: Accidental Voyeurism, Coming Out, Coming Out As A Threesome, Multi, POV Outsider, Season/Series 09, Secret Relationship, Threesome, Threesome - F/M/M, five things
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-04
Updated: 2013-08-04
Packaged: 2017-12-22 10:45:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,728
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/912282
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Leyenn/pseuds/Leyenn





	How Cam Found Out (And How He Didn't)

**1.**

He's still kinda pissed that Sam apparently had more important things to do than discover whether goddamn _Merlin_ was a goddamn _Ancient_ , so he's somewhat surprised to hear her voice coming from Jackson's lab when he walks by.

" _*I'm sorry you missed the Daedalus. I know how much you wanted to go.*_ "

"You know how much I wanted to stay here, too."

Cam pauses, frowning, puzzled. Jackson was practically halfway to Atlantis already before Vala slapped the bracelet on his wrist. Not the look of a man who wanted to stick around.

But Sam's voice, even flattened slightly by the video feed, sounds like she thinks differently. " _*I know.*_ " There's a pause. " _*You could still go. The Daedalus will be back, in a few months-*_ "

"And say goodbye all over again?" Daniel's voice rises. "I can't do that, Sam. Could you?"

" _*It's a great opportunity for you, for our understanding of the Ancients-*_ "

"I'm putting you on mute," Daniel says loudly, in the same tone that thirty years ago he'd have probably used to say _la la la la not listening_.

Sam laughs. " _*All right, all right. I'll stop talking about it. I just... I don't want you to regret staying.*_ "

Cam peeks around the door. Jackson is seated on a stool at his desk with his laptop open in front of him, leaning in close to the screen.

"I'm not leaving," he says, his voice soft but firm. "Not going to Atlantis, not ascending, not packing it all in and moving back to Egypt. I'm not leaving either of you. Not again." His smile is quiet and intimate as he adds, "And I won't regret it. I promise," and Cam suddenly thinks he shouldn't be eavesdropping, but it's a little late to consider that when Daniel glances up and spots him lingering in the doorway. "Ah, I gotta go." He smiles back at the screen. "I'll talk to you later, okay?"

Cam imagines that same smile on Sam's lips as her voice says, " _*Okay.*_ "

Daniel smiles again, taps the keyboard and takes a moment to do something - shutting down the call, most likely - before he finally straightens and looks up again. "Mitchell?"

"Daniel." He steps into the lab. "Something you wanna tell me?"

"I was just talking to Sam," Daniel says, unnecessarily.

"So I heard." Cam jerks his chin at the laptop. "She still busy?"

"Yeah, there's this big experiment going on, using some of the Ancient tech we brought back from Antarctica..."

"You two are having sex, aren't you?"

Daniel stops mid-sentence and opens his mouth soundlessly for a moment. "Ah, that depends on your definition of -"

"Sex?"

"I was going to say 'are'."

"You're staying on Earth now," Cam reminds him.

Daniel smiles. "Then, yes. I guess. Yes." His smile widens as if he's just realising what he means. "Ah, before you say anything, I know you're angling to get us all back together, and-"

"Hey, say no more." Cam holds up his hands. "I heard that 'either of you'."

"Oh." Daniel looks relieved, then confused, then surprised all in quick succession. "Oh! No. No paternity leave for this team, at least not any time soon. It's more that... it's more than sex. Sam and Jack and I are..." He's obviously fighting a mischievous grin, but he's also failing. "Well, there's a reason Jack took this promotion."

Now it's Cam's turn to gape like a fish out of water, because he's pretty sure he wasn't expecting that. From the sudden grin on Daniel's face, he was expecting it to be unexpected, too, and he's apparently finding this pretty damn funny.

"Don't worry. We made a small fortune in the base pool when it came out - so to speak."

Well, Cam supposes, at least he didn't lose any money on it.

 

 

**2.**

It's their third overnighter off-world, on a deserted planet with three suns that might once have held an Ancient outpost but now seems to be inhabited only by a dominant slug-like species with whiskers like a lion and definitely no discernible sentience at all, when Cam looks up from selecting breakfast to see Sam duck out of Daniel's tent.

"Morning." She wanders over to the slowly smouldering fire, absently finger-combing her hair, drops her field pack on the grass and sits down on a tall rock opposite where Cam's been sitting since the sun came up.

When it seems pretty clear she's not going to say anything else, Cam clears his throat. "Uh. Sam?"

"Hmm?" She digs around in her pack for something, only paying him half her attention until the pause goes on long enough that she looks up. "What?"

He just looks at her, both eyebrows raised. Looks back at the tent. Looks back at her.

It might just be the weird morning light, but she looks like she's blushing, just a bit. "Ah. That wasn't exactly discreet of me, was it?"

He grins. "Nope."

She winces, though he's fairly sure she's not that upset. Actually she looks more amused. "Sorry. If it's a problem, I'll try and be a little less obvious in future."

"Hey, no, no. No skin off my nose. What happens off-world stays off-world. I just figured, y'know..."

"What?"

"Well, that it was probably you and O'Neill doin' the nasty."

Sam grins like a cat with a whole flock of canaries. Suddenly Cam's horribly afraid that he's the one going deep red - it'd match the deep shit he's just stepped in - as amusement flips over into horror like a coin in his head. Shit. Talk about putting both feet in his mouth at once. How's he supposed to deal with that? He's amazed that Sam Carter of all people isn't more circumspect - but oh, fuck, what if she just expects him to keep her secret -

He clears his throat loudly. Again. It doesn't do much to help. " _Are_ you..."

Sam slides down off her rock, leans back and stretches her legs out, grinning. Cam feels a great yawning chasm open up under his apparently screwed ass.

"Shit. Sam! Does he know-"

And of course, that's the moment the tent unzips a second time and Daniel wanders out, with messy hair, putting on his glasses and squinting into the sunlight.

"Morning." He wanders over and drops down next to Sam, reaching for the coffee in its hot flask near her feet. "What's up?"

"Cameron thinks I'm cheating on you with Jack," Sam says conversationally, and hands Daniel two metal cups from her pack.

Daniel doesn't even twitch, just looks him straight in the eye. It's like being targeted by radar.

"More likely cheating on Jack with me," he says easily, and pours black coffee into a cup before handing it back to her.

Sam takes the cup in both hands. "You think?"

"You two are always the favorite." Daniel pours the other cup. It takes Cam a moment to realise it's being held out to him.

"Bribery?" But he takes the coffee anyway. He needs it.

Daniel smirks and takes a gulp of coffee straight from the flask. Sam doesn't complain at his manners, just reaches over and tries to smooth down a rebellious spike of hair over his ear.

"If we wanted you to keep a secret from Jack," Daniel says, "we'd probably have to pay much better than that."

"If you wanted me to keep a secret you shouldn't have joined the team," he snaps out, surprised that he says it quite that vehemently.

"Re-joined," Daniel corrects him, instantly matching his tone. Sam surrenders the battle with Daniel's hair and squeezes his shoulder instead. He winces apologetically.

"Sorry. It still takes some getting used to."

"A bit like missing a limb," Sam says.

"Or a frontal lobe."

"And it's colder at night." Sam curls her hands around her cup. "You think Thor would clone him again for us?"

"Quieter, though," Daniel says, thoughtfully. "Not so much snoring."

"There is that." She cocks her head, taking a sip of coffee. "No being told to shut up and wait 'til the morning, either. I think we made some good progress on your theory last night."

"We're going to get a lot less sleep."

"But a lot more work done."

"But yelled at when we get home."

"Some things don't change."

Cam throws an MRE at each of them. Sam catches her expertly with one hand; Daniel's hits him in the chest and drops into his lap. They both look at him, amusement on their faces.

He shakes his head, resolving to do something truly terrible to their tent for at least the next six missions. "I hate both of you."

Sam grins and rips open her breakfast. "Thanks, Shaft."

 

 

**3.**

Somehow, Cam expected the facilities on board one of Earth's first interstellar spaceships, especially one built with the help of Asgard technology, to be less... Spartan.

He's not sure why - the _Prometheus_ is basically the overgrown child of an aircraft carrier and a USAF military base, and he can't imagine the Asgard have much use for luxurious bathrooms. Still, it'd have been nice to get clean in the privacy of the cabin he's claimed, rather than jogging down the corridor to the communal showers.

At least it's mostly deserted. The only other person in the locker room is Daniel, who's standing in front of an open locker barefoot with his boots on the floor, and is pulling his t-shirt over his head with one hand as Cam walks in.

For an archaeologist, Cam thinks, a touch impressed, the guy's pretty damn well built. Sure, Daniel Jackson is on SG-1, but Cam's shared many a locker room with many a combat vet who didn't have that kind of build - or, more interestingly, the kind of thin, vivid red stripes running down both sides of Daniel's back, four to a set.

Well, well, well.

"Hey," he says lightly. Daniel turns around.

"Oh, hey." He screws his shirt up and drops it on the bench. "You had the same idea, huh?"

Cam grins. "Not the same idea as you, apparently."

Daniel looks confused, for long enough that Cam adds to his salacious grin by holding up a hand with his fingers clawed.

"Oh. Oh!" Daniel clears his throat and tries to twist around before obviously realising he won't manage to see a thing. "Um..."

"Hey, no worries. What you and Vala get up to is no business of mine."

"Vala," Daniel says. "Um. Yes. Yes!"

"I'm sure that's what she said," Cam quips, and makes a mental note that Daniel Jackson is pretty easy to fluster with the right approach - he's never seen a guy finish stripping or disappear into a shower stall that fast, either. Handy to know.

Of course, then they lose Vala and Daniel ends up in the infirmary for forty-eight hours and Cam feels a bit like an ass for being so much of a typical locker room jock, but apparently the slimmest possibility of survival is practically a certainty around the SGC and, Sam assures him, it's not a successful mission without Daniel hooked up to a monitor or two at the end of it. So Cam manages to not really feel guilty and pretty much forgets about it.

Until the whole thing with Khalek, the longest debriefing in the world, and Cam's already stripping down on his way into the locker room when he meets Daniel coming the other way, already showered with a towel wrapped around his waist and another one held up to his head, scrubbing at his hair.

Cam claims a locker and throws his uniform jacket inside.

"Good shooting," he says lightly, for something to say. Daniel looks over one shoulder at him.

"Thanks." His voice is mild, and Cam glances around to make sure it's sincere, because he likes Daniel and he likes to think he's a sensitive guy when he needs to be -

There are marks on Daniel's back, flushed a darker color by the heat - deep red lines dotted with tiny, dark scabs, in distinct lines of four.

Oh, Cam thinks, because there's a very short list of people who were on the _Prometheus_ and are now here at the SGC, he can cross himself off said list and he's pretty sure Teal'c isn't that way inclined.

Well. He got _that_ wrong.

Daniel's smiling very slightly, almost sly, and looks like he's about to say something when a cell phone rings. Instead he curses and rummages about in his pile of clothes until the sound stops, and he holds the phone to his ear.

"Jackson." A pause. "Oh, hey. What's up?" Another pause. Cam can't hear anyone talking on the other end, but then Daniel says, "we're both fine, Jack," and actually rolls his eyes, so that all Cam can do is offer a sympathetic wince.

"Really. Yes. Yes. How have you even got that report already? Are you actually checking your email?" Daniel sighs, but a smile plays on his lips for a moment. "I'm telling her you said that. No. No. No, I'm fine, but I'm kinda naked here - no, I was taking a _shower_. Blood," like that's a standard explanation. Cam turns back to his locker and bends to untie his boots. He tries not to eavesdrop, but it's pretty much impossible.

"I emptied a clip, Jack. So did Mitchell. Point blank. We're definitely secure." Short pause, some shuffling of fabric. "I know." Long pause. "Look, I'll tell you later, okay? Sam's picking up takeout and I'd really like to finish getting my pants on, here. You are coming home tonight?"

Cam accidentally ties a knot in his bootlace trying to get it off.

"Okay. Well, we'll try and wait for you." More shuffling and the sound of a zipper. Daniel's voice teasing, but then dropping into something softer. "See you later. Yeah, I know. Sam too."

Cam momentarily forgets how to get undressed.

After another short pause there's the sound of boots dropping to the floor and a phone snapping shut, and he should just quietly carry on bumbling to himself until Daniel's finished and gone, but somehow he doesn't. Probably because he's an idiot.

Daniel doesn't really look any different. He's dressed, finishing tying a shoe, but that's about all.

"Um," Cam says.

Daniel grins and hoists his kit over one shoulder. "See you tomorrow, Cameron."

 

 

**4.**

Probably the last person Cam expects to see, on turning a corner of the SGC first thing in the morning, is -

"General O'Neill, sir."

O'Neill glances back toward him like he's not entirely sure how to take that greeting, simple as it is. "Good morning, Mitchell."

"I'm not sure where the rest of my-" thankfully the morning mug of Joe kicks in quickly enough, and saves him from the awkwardness about to set forth from his tongue. "Ah, where Carter and Jackson are, sir."

"In the mess, if you double time it. Though Daniel's on a roll, so they could be back in the lab by now." O'Neill cocks his head. "What am I talking about. Of course they're back in the lab by now."

"Ah. Thank you, sir, but I wasn't..." Apparently he needs to start doubling his morning espresso shot. Not nearly as on the ball as he thought. "Sorry, I just assumed-"

"So you did." O'Neill starts walking again, and since he hasn't been dismissed and they both seem to be going in the same direction, Cam falls awkwardly into step beside him.

"So..." It seems after a long few seconds that O'Neill's not going to talk, so Cam takes it on himself. "To what do we owe the pleasure, sir?"

O'Neill shrugs affably. "Oh, you know. Visiting the old haunt. Treading the old paths once more. All that sort of thing."

"Keeping an eye on us, sir?"

"Now why would I need to do that?"

Cam's suddenly almost glad he didn't get to serve on this man's team on a daily basis. He'd trip himself up five times a day, at least.

"No reason at all, sir," he says quickly. Probably too quickly, from the sideways look it gets him.

"Uh-huh."

"Sam's got some interesting experiments going on," he offers, carefully.

O'Neill just looks at him again. "Uh-huh."

Obviously Cam's not as good at faking excitement about gate efficiency modelling as he thought. "She says it's interesting," he corrects himself. Small talk with a one star general and eight-year gate veteran. It's tougher than it looks.

"Carter thinks anything with equations is interesting." They stop in front of the elevator: O'Neill swipes a card, punches the button. "Apparently 'magnets' just isn't a good enough explanation."

"Magnets."

"They're the answer to everything. Trust me." O'Neill steps into the elevator and turns to face him. "Just ask Carter."

Cam gets the feeling that'll get him into more trouble than it's probably worth. He steps in beside O'Neill and pushes for level 27. O'Neill, he notices, hasn't picked a destination.

There's another awkward silence as the elevator rumbles to life, so awkward that Cam finds the thing he probably - definitely - shouldn't say, coming out of his mouth; "I'm surprised to just bump into you around here, sir."

O'Neill arches an eyebrow. "Oh?"

Shit. He's dived in now. Nothing for it but to try and swim. "I'm not sure I'd be able to come back so soon. If I'd left," he adds, because for some reason his stupid mouth thinks that needs to be made clear.

The eyebrow drops. O'Neill twists slowly to look at him for a long moment, and Cam's pretty sure he should just have gone with the awkward silence.

"Oh," he says, slowly. Right. Wow, he's an idiot this morning. "You and Colonel Carter."

O'Neill looks like he could really use an emergency stop on this elevator right now. "Problem with that?"

"No sir." Sam's business is her own, though he's got no idea how she manages to fit it in. Probably dating someone who's done the job for eight years helps with that. And even if he did, in fact, have a problem, right now he's pretty sure if he voiced it _anything you want_ could to turn into _anywhere cold, wet and solitary_ in short order.

O'Neill seems to be weighing up whether he's sincere, or actually an ass in disguise. Eventually he gets; "Well. Good."

That's it.

The elevator ticks past level 15.

17.

20.

The silence is so heavy, Cam actually looks up to check the roof isn't descending on him. Again.

22.

24.

The elevator starts to slow. Level 26, one floor up from the briefing room.

O'Neill lets out a slow, loud breath that sounds vaguely like _oh, for crying out loud_.

Cam turns to look at him. "General?"

The other man looks him in the eye. "It's not just Carter."

For a second he's not sure he's actually hearing what he's hearing. "Sir?"

"It's not. Just. Carter."

"Oh." He's really not sure how to approach that. He's not really sure what he's being told.

Level 27. Briefing room. The elevator doors slide open, empty corridor on the other side. Cam steps out, slowly.

"Mitchell."

He turns back around.

"Me and Carter," O'Neill says, simply, "and Daniel." Not exactly shouting across the SGC but not quiet against anyone walking by, either.

"Oh." It's about all he can think of to say. When he imagined this morning, the possibility of General O'Neill, hero of the SGC, trampling the remains of _don't ask, don't tell_ into the ground wasn't high on his list of planned events, nor was finding out half his team are apparently involved.

"Well." O'Neill pauses. "Now... you know. You know."

Cam clears his throat. "Yeah." Now he knows.

"See you around," O'Neill says, and pushes a button somewhere high up the keypad.

The elevator doors slide shut just as Cam manages to get off a salute.

 

 

**5.**

It turns out it's tough to get good takeout in this town. They're in the middle of some extremely rare downtime; Cam's spent the day catching up on paperwork; he didn't even notice the time until he left his office and realised the rest of SG-1 were long gone and even Walter was packing up for the night.

By the time he hit the surface he'd remembered the last time he ate - a half bite of sandwich somewhere around eleven - and he's got a hankering for a good dim sum, preferably a crazy amount and preferably at least four hours ago.

Which is when he realises how hard it is to find good dim sum in this town, of course. A brief Google turns up only two potential options, one of them way across town and with a dress code he's definitely not going to match up to.

The Shanghai Bite it is then. He hopes they know how to make a decent pork shaomai.

The place turns out to be on a restaurant plaza out near the mall, which is good, since it takes less concentration to find and Cam's eyes are still slightly crossed from writing mission reports. At least, that's what he puts it down to when he thinks he spots Daniel's car a few rows over from where he's just managed to squeeze his truck between a classic Ford and a lurid yellow Hummer. It's a busy Friday evening and he should probably just have abandoned hope of a good dinner and called for a pizza, but after that feat of spatial engineering he figures, he's committed now.

There's a steakhouse across the walk from the Bite; for a moment his stomach is struck with indecision, weighing up the thought of dumplings and egg rolls against a great big Texan ribeye...

At a candle-lit table in the window of the steakhouse, Sam laughs at something Daniel's just said, bumping his shoulder with her own as General O'Neill takes a round of beers from a rather bemused-looking waitress.

Cam's sudden desire for steak flees just as quickly as it arrived. He reminds himself that they were O'Neill's team for years: of course they probably want to catch up, and it's not exactly as if the Brigadier General in charge of Homeworld Security needs to take a plane to get here for a night out. It still feels a little like being shut out in the cold, but his stomach is far more put out than his feelings, and it'd really like to remind him that he still hasn't had any dinner.

He leaves them to their steak and goes on the offensive for a serious round of dumplings.

Forty-five minutes and two arguments over his order later, he finally makes it back out into the parking lot with three steaming baskets and half an egg roll already in hand. The Shanghai Bite, it turns out, has _terrible_ customer service but does make damn good shaomai.

The parking lot has emptied drastically - if he didn't know better, he'd be wondering if aliens have been by for some easy test subjects. He checks his watch: gone midnight. Jackson's car is still there, though, with the driver's side door open and a take out bag sitting on the roof. A pair of shapes appear from behind the car, two figures of roughly equal height and build, washed out under the low-powered floodlights scattered around the lot, but undeniably entangled.

" _Jack!_ " That's Daniel's voice, sharp with laughter, distant but clear across the all-but-silent parking lot. "You're gonna get us into so much trouble."

"Same old, same old." O'Neill's voice carries just as easily. "Carter's fault, anyway."

"She's not even here."

"Exactly. What's she doing in there?"

"Paying your bar bill-" Daniel's voice breaks with a sudden groan. " _Jack_... God, do you want to get _arrested_?"

"Never gonna happen," O'Neill says. His voice is lower, bordering on a husky drawl. "Now would ya shut up?"

Daniel's only response is another groan, and even if it were pitch black Cam would know perfectly without looking - he should not be looking, why is he still looking - exactly what's going on a hundred feet away against that car -

"Jeez, I leave you two alone for five minutes."

\- and if seeing General Jack O'Neill rounding second base with Doctor Daniel Jackson wasn't enough to throw his brain in a spin, Sam's appearance just about flips the world upside down. She doesn't sound shocked or upset or surprised or even annoyed - just fondly exasperated with maybe... probably... more than a hint of aroused in there just to totally fuck with Cam's mind.

He watches over the hood of his truck as she grabs the take out and tosses it in the back seat, then slides her hands into Daniel's back pockets and presses up against his back, her mouth dipping to the back of his neck.

Daniel groans again. "Oh, come on, no fair..."

Sam's wicked laugh carries right across the parking lot, and she leans over Daniel's shoulder to exchange a quick, dirty-looking kiss with O'Neill before she does back off - and holds up a hand with what must be Daniel's car keys dangling from one finger.

"I'll drive. Last one in makes breakfast."

Cam ducks inside his truck and waits in the dark with the ignition off and dinner slowly cooling until they go past his rear view mirror, Sam driving Daniel's car like a NASCAR veteran with two dark shapes molded into one in the back seat.

Monday morning, they turn up to work just the same as ever, slide into seats beside each other in the briefing room and murmur about gate addresses. Sam pours them both coffee. Daniel spreads out the mission file across the table.

Cam sits back and just watches.

 

 

**6.**

Lam's in the middle of saying, "the next twenty-four hours are critical," when the infirmary door slams back and a tall grey-haired guy in civvies barrels through, with Walter trailing helplessly a few strides behind him. Well, Cam supposes, of course he'd know the way.

Lam hesitates: Cam wonders, with that sharp weirdness of the moment, if she's ever met General Jack O'Neill.

From his self-appointed guard point at the back of the group surrounding the bed, Teal'c bows his head slightly, even though O'Neill's eyes fix on the bruised, bloodied and too still form of Sam Carter and don't waver for a moment as he approaches. Daniel doesn't even look round, even when O'Neill is less than a step behind the chair he's claimed at Sam's left elbow. He can probably hear the guy breathing, but his eyes are trained on the bed just the same.

"Carolyn," Landry says.

"Yes sir. As I was saying," Cam notices the way she looks at O'Neill and then just as quickly looks away, "The next twenty-four hours will be the critical period. After that, we should start to know if the internal bleeding has caused any permanent damage to her organs. I'm sorry," she says, softer, and Cam really thinks she is.

"I had her," Daniel says, quietly, after a minute. His good hand creeps toward Sam's on the bed. "And then I just... didn't."

O'Neill puts a hand lightly on his shoulder - the one not supported by a thick sling. Observant, Cam thinks. Why he should be surprised, he doesn't know. "Not your fault."

"Jack-"

" _Daniel_." O'Neill's tone one-ups Daniel's with perfect precision. Cam wonders how long it took him to get that right. "Don't gimme that crap. _Not your fault_."

Daniel lifts one hand and puts it over O'Neill's.

"An earthquake." There's the slightest waver to his voice, for the first time since P4X-679 started trembling under their feet. Part of Cam's mind finds the sound jarring, world-altering, even though the other half is amazed at how it's stayed steady this long.

He didn't see it happen: it would almost be less surreal if he had, he thinks. But they'd paired off for standard recon long before P4X-679 decided they really weren't welcome: all he remembers is the tremor, the realisation and the sudden premonition that things were about to go badly wrong; Sam over the radio, calm but concerned, with Daniel quieter but no less concerned behind her; then hell literally breaking out from the ground all around them. Running for the gate, miles off, Teal'c pounding along beside him; Sam talking over the rumbling, giving their position; then all in one single moment, some kind of sound like he's never heard and will remember for the rest of his life, Daniel's voice screaming " _Sam!_ " and the sickening crunch of a radio going unwillingly silent.

He had her half freed before they even found him, one shoulder at an odd angle and both hands bloodied from the sharp black rocks. His voice right then, Cam remembers, was frighteningly calm. Now it sounds like it's unravelling, one word at a time.

"After everything else we've ever been through, it was a fucking _earthquake_."

O'Neill puts the other hand over his, and squeezes. "Don't, Daniel."

"It's just ridiculous."

"Which is why it's not going to be the thing that gets her."

"You didn't see her, Jack, you didn't see the way-"

" _Don't_ ," O'Neill says, sharper. Daniel sighs and takes Sam's hand in his, gently like he's not sure he should dare.

"Sorry. You know I don't... I just can't stop seeing it happen."

"She'll pull through." O'Neill sounds firm. Cam wonders if that's just refusal to admit defeat, and if that's what got them through for eight years together, and if he has that same bullheaded resolve within himself, because he's starting to think he might need it.

Sam is finally judged out of danger forty-six hours after coming through the gate in Teal'c's arms; she wakes up four hours later. Cam doesn't rush to the infirmary - he's pretty sure there are three guys who'll already be doing that. When he does go to see her, she's sitting up in her bed, bruises blooming across the side of her face, but she's trying to smile and he's not surprised to see O'Neill and Jackson still sitting at her bedside.

 

 

**7.**

"So how's Mitchell settling in?"

"Pretty good, for a newbie," Daniel says, tossing a towel back through the open bathroom door. It lands with a thud; Sam shoots him a dirty look over her shoulder. Daniel smirks and reaches for her instead, briefly drags her a step closer to kiss her on his way to the bed.

"Mm." Sam wraps her hand behind his head and turns the kiss wet and dirty with a lot of tongue, grinning at the look on Daniel's face when she pulls back just as swiftly. "He hasn't gone crazy yet," she says, in answer to the question from the bed. Daniel lets her go with a smile. "But one of us really should have told him."

Jack crosses his hands behind his head. "'Sorry, but I finally got sick of breaking _all_ the fraternisation regs on a daily basis'?"

"He knew he wasn't getting _you_." Daniel stretches out on the bed, arranging himself comfortably with space for Sam in the middle. Jack shoots him a look.

"Teams change all the time."

"Not our team." Daniel rolls his eyes. "Come on, Jack, you knew what he was asking for when he requested SG-1."

"I like Mitchell." Jack shrugs. "But you guys wanted what you wanted. Not his decision to make."

Sam finishes scrubbing at her hair and hangs her own towel neatly on the back of a chair, giving Daniel a pointed look. He smirks at her and beckons with one hand. She smiles and fits herself in between him and Jack, who rolls onto his side to spoon around her and reaches across to wrap his fingers around Daniel's thigh. He only managed to beam in at past eleven, to find Sam and Daniel just through the door themselves.

"It's still weird, not having you around." Sam slides her foot back between Jack's calves, hooking her ankle behind his.

"Not sure about sticking around for the long haul?" He nuzzles her neck, rubbing his hand up Daniel's thigh.

"Me neither." Daniel tugs himself closer, fitting tightly against Sam and leaning in to kiss her, his fingers weaving into Jack's hair. It's not quite the color it used to be, the color it was when they met. It's longer now he's not in the field, though probably only the three people in this bed would notice.

Sam's hair is longer too, wavy these days and skirting on the edge of regulations, a subtle sign that Jack's hit the nail on the head. They all know Area 51 is like Sam's wet dream, the same as Atlantis is Daniel's. There's a lot she can do there, progress she can make, discoveries to be had. Maybe it would be a close second for Daniel, too, given that he's not going to Atlantis any time soon. No direct line of command, no life or death decisions. No reason, finally, for any of them to hide spending their nights in a bed this big.

They made the decision to leave because it was better, or it felt that way at the time. Now they're back, and it feels...

"Still, maybe it'll work out." Daniel rests his forehead close to Sam's. She smiles.

"Ever the optimist."

"Gotta be."

"It's still not the same," she says, tired.

"Damn straight, it better not be." Jack's lips trail up her jaw and she laughs as Daniel grins, turns her head to meet Jack's mouth. The kiss is deep and slow and has something like possessiveness in it, especially when Jack only breaks from her mouth to lean over and capture Daniel's instead.

"Never gonna be the same," he says roughly, cheek against hers and lips an inch from Daniel's. Quiet but very definite. "And that's okay."

Sam smiles. They do still forget, sometimes, that Jack has always been far smarter than he lets on. "Yeah. It is."

Jack drops his head back onto the pillow behind her, nuzzles his face into the back of her neck. "Told ya."

"Speaking of telling." Daniel turns his face to the pillow, his eyes drifting shut. "We probably should tell Mitchell."

"Just gimme a heads up," Jack mutters, low enough that she can hardly feel his breathing on her skin.

"Mm." There's no rush, Sam thinks. They're used to not telling. It can wait.

 

 

**


End file.
